


Requiem

by iFlail



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Bottom Crowley (Good Omens), F/M, Good Omens Big Bang, M/M, Multi, Other, Post-Canon, Reincarnation, Smut, Temporarily female Crowley, Temporary Character Death, Top Aziraphale (Good Omens), Wingfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-15
Updated: 2020-02-15
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:34:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22741090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iFlail/pseuds/iFlail
Summary: Crowley isn't an idiot. He recognizes the pattern, and no miracle—no power granted unto to him by God—can stop it.He's tried.Undo what’s been done, he's begged, emptying himself of everything until he’s nearly irreparably drained, barely more than a husk, a shell—a human.And still—When Crowley finds him, Aziraphale dies.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 23
Kudos: 104
Collections: Good Omens Big Bang 2019





	Requiem

**Author's Note:**

> SO MANY THINGS TO PREFACE THIS.
> 
> First, I'd be absolutely remiss if I didn't acknowledge my amazing artist, little-arcadia. She drew the most wonderful artwork for this story, and also put up with all my delays with grace and kindness. Thank you for being an awesome artist and an awesome person.
> 
> Second, thank you to my betas, Nim and Jenetica, for reassuring me that my story isn't wretchedly OOC and that I am not a blithering idiot despite the glaring continuity errors you gently pointed out. 
> 
> Third, I'd like to thank the Academy—
> 
> Just kidding.
> 
> In all honesty, I... am not super happy with how my story turned out. I know what you're thinking: _Then why am I still here, iFlail?_
> 
> Great question, dear reader! 
> 
> When I signed up for this Bang, there was no way I could have accounted for two wildly difficult losses I would face at the end of fall: Two very good friends of mine lost their sweet baby boy two months after he was born; and a wonderful, dear, close friend lost his life to illness very unexpectedly just a few short weeks later. 
> 
> As you can imagine, I lost weeks of writing. Writing about loss (writing at _all_ ) while dealing with grief was painful, and dealing with the frustration I was directing at myself for not being up to par only added to my lack of willingness to even open up my doc and put words on paper. By the time I was back to something resembling normalcy, my work schedule had picked up, and being able to sit down and work thoughtfully on this story was tough. So my goal turned more to getting the story out than to doing it justice, which, admittedly, sounds pretty terrible. But mama ain't raise a quitter, so here we are. 
> 
> To the admins of the Bang: Thank you for being understanding and working with me. Sorry I was the problem child. 
> 
> And to the weird Ao3 glitch that adds a random space after italicized words: Fuck you, too. But I can't be assed to fix it right now, so you win this time. 
> 
> I'd like to imagine the soundtrack to this story is My Heart Will Go On. But like. The recorder version. You know the one. 
> 
> ***
> 
> J, you never knew I wrote fic (let alone smut), which was probably for the best. So this one is _not_ dedicated to you. Sorry, boo. Still love you, though. 
> 
> Really, I do.

Three weeks. 

It's hardly three bloody _weeks_ before the peace is shattered.

Three weeks, of course, in the context of six thousand years, passes in the blink of an eye—but it's still more than enough time for complacency to settle comfortably beneath Aziraphale's skin. It lends him a false sense of security, when perhaps he should have been _slightly_ more vigilant. 

He's learned intimately* what exactly the humans mean when they say hindsight is 20/20.

* _And quite recently, to his own chagrin._

He's just come from Crowley's, which is _new_. 

Albeit hardly unwelcome, he supposes giddily. They whiled away the hours drinking, and he paid extra mind to chatter away about all the silly things he knew would make Crowley smile that one smile he's particularly fond of, the genuine one that—though he's sure Crowley would be loath to hear it—makes the air around them go warm and fuzzy and feel an awful lot like _love_.*

* _He's quite positive it wasn't the wine._

And, well, there's nothing like the end of the world to inspire a change in pace.

Something churns happily in his stomach, and he lets it linger. Wonderful human bodies. There's no reason he can't let his guard down a bit, after all. 

Except, when his key turns in the lock of his bookshop and the door is shut behind him, he thinks he might have made an error in judgement.

The bookshop smells Heavenly.*

* _This is not, contrary to what the English language might have you believe, a particularly nice smell. To Aziraphale, Heaven smells somewhat like an office supply chain store._

The front floor is blessedly empty, and he spins on his heel, already halfway out the door again when someone clears their throat. 

_Damn._

He turns, steeling himself, and forces a smile on his face. 

The irony that Gabriel has always been a harbinger of bad news is not lost on him.

"Gabriel!" His enthusiasm is false to his own ears (and really, Crowley _has_ been rubbing off on him), and he wrings his hands behind his back, floundering to fill the silence. "I can't say I was expecting to see you again quite so soon." He swallows. "Do you bring Word from God?" 

Gabriel stares at him blankly.

"No," he says slowly, as if Aziraphale has said something quite stupid. "And as a matter of fact, after your little shitshow down at the airfield—" 

It would be a disgrace to call Gabriel's smile serpentine, and yet—

"Heaven is under new management."

Aziraphale splutters, and his feet are doing an odd, nervous shuffle quite unbidden. "But… that's _blasphemy._ "

There's a tinny laugh, and he whirls around to where Michael had been standing, unnoticed, to the side. 

"That's a bit rich, isn't it, Aziraphale?" She circles him slowly. "Consorting with _demons_?"

"We can't have you running around fucking things up anymore." Gabriel sighs, looking almost sorry. But his eyes are steely, and Aziraphale braces himself against the door. "You've made quite the little _nest_ for yourself here." 

Alarm bells blast in Aziraphale's head. It's a strange thing to say. Gabriel traces the spine of a book, distaste apparent on his features. He pulls his hand away, rubbing his fingers together curiously before snapping them so suddenly Aziraphale starts where he stands. 

In an instant, he finds his arms gripped at his sides, Michael and Sandalphon—and goodness, when did he even get here, Aziraphale wonders dizzily—frog-marching him until he's on his knees, and Gabriel is looking down at him in thinly veiled satisfaction. 

"Come now, this is quite unnecessary—"

Gabriel laughs coolly before leaning forward, scrunching his face derisively. "Isn't it though?" 

Another snap, and Aziraphale finds himself quite unable to move. They speak in unison, a chant that fills him with dread, and he squirms frantically, panic mounting. He can feel something odd happening to his corporation, and the last thing to escape his lips is—

" _Crowley."_

* * *

Crowley wakes up with the sense that something is missing.

It's like waking up to find one of your socks has gotten lost in the sheets, or losing a contact lens after rubbing your eyes. There's a lack of balance that's oddly uncomfortable, like he's suddenly gone deaf in one ear. It's unsettling. Visceral. 

Perhaps he did worse of a job getting the wine out of his system than he thought. 

It’s a half-hearted notion, at most. 

All the same—it wouldn't hurt to check in with Aziraphale. Just to see if he feels it, too.

They've been living in each other's pockets a bit, since the Debaclypse.* It bothers him altogether less than he might have anticipated it would—having an angel on his shoulder. 

* _Crowley was proud of that one. Aziraphale had looked at him fondly the first time he said it, and it was an excellent pun, to boot._

He calls the shop from where he lay sprawled across his bed, sleep-warm and fidgety, chasing the softness of the sheets with his bare skin. The ringback tone is shrill in his ear, and he lets the phone rest on the pillow beside his head, listening with his eyes shut for Aziraphale to pick up.

" _Hello, there!"_

"Hey, angel. Funny story—"

" _I'm terribly sorry to have missed your call. If you'd like to leave a message—"_

Crowley hangs up with a long-suffering sigh, tossing his phone to the side. No matter. He's never needed an invite to go to the shop, anyway.

* * *

When he arrives, the bookshop _reeks_.*

* _To Crowley, Heaven smells corrosive. It burns his eyes and constricts his throat, like the chlorine gas that bubbled out of the trenches in Belgium._

He could smell it halfway down the street, leaking into the cab of the Bentley through the windows. Pulling up to the curb, he gags as the fumes bleed through the open doors of the shop, acrid clouds that roll noxiously into the street.

The door of the Bentley slams shut behind him as he tugs his collar over his face. His eyes water behind his glasses, and he curses as he forces himself inside, fear driving him forward. 

"Angel?" he shouts. "Aziraphale?"

"Oh, honey. You're home." 

Crowley twists around. Gabriel stares at him from Aziraphale's armchair, one eyebrow cocked as he flips idly through a Bible.

"Was wondering when you'd show up."

Crowley burns with a scalding, quickfire fury. "What have you done?" 

Gabriel scoffs, closing the book with a snap. He tosses it onto the table beside him, where it slides in the dust before toppling off the edge. 

"Nothing. Well, a favor, really." He leans back in the chair and gestures broadly, looking pleased with himself. "We gave him what he wanted."

"Where is he?" The demand is sibilant, his hands trembling at his sides.

Gabriel looks at him, unfazed. "Not sure. Seven billion people on this earth, hard to keep track of just one."

Confusion smothers some of the angry fire building in his bones. "What?"

Gabriel rolls his eyes. "Aziraphale's been semi-permanently recorporated."

Crowley stares.

"He'll be re-born as a human," Gabriel is still talking, smug. "He'll have no idea who he is. Completely cut off from the Heavenly host."

He feels like he's Falling. 

"—had to push the paperwork through, but we got it done—"

"He'll die," Crowley chokes.

Irritation twists Gabriel's face, and he scoffs again. 

"After that whole _fiasco_ with the hellfire, we thought—" he pauses, laughing humorlessly "—we thought he'd _Fall._ And then he didn't, so this—” he gestures again “—was the next best thing."

Gabriel stands, and Crowley stares, frozen, as he paces the room. “His human bodies will die. You got me there. He'll be born over, and over, and over again until the apocalypse comes— _again_.” The look he throws Crowley is caustic.“We’ll need a contingency plan for once he's back in Heaven,” he seems to add to himself as an afterthought.

Crowley shakes. Gabriel moves to stand in front of him. 

"Look around," he says. "Look at all this human… _junk_. This is what he wanted." 

Something inside Crowley ignites, and he _burns_ —quite literally—with anger, hellfire licking at the floor around him. Gabriel steps back, sniffing haughtily out of reach of the flames.

"You should get that checked."

And then he's gone before Crowley can do anything about it, and he watches the flames catch at leaves of paper on the floor and wonders that he should live this nightmare twice.

* * *

The world is big, and he's only one demon.

349,722 babies were born the day that Aziraphale's grace blinked out of existence.

349,722 souls, in 195 nations, and it takes him weeks to find them all—to creep into nurseries deep in the night, and to brush his hand over peach fuzz and soft skin to know in the end that none of them are Aziraphale.

Crowley panics.

He panics that Aziraphale, tiny and helpless, should have already lived and died once.

He panics because, now, he's lost his starting point.

He panics because maybe he didn't know Aziraphale well enough to recognize his soul at all.

So he sleeps. 

The world fades away, and the ache deep in his chest with it. 

He has no plans to wake, but he _does_. 

Something draws him out of his slumber, like an alarm buzzing incessantly in his head. He's not sure why—but he does know, instinctively, it's been a long time. Perhaps not in the life of a demon, but in the eyes of a human? He can feel the shift of time. The souls that walk the streets are as unfamiliar to him as the halls of Heaven anymore, and he reaches out and _feels_.

Eighty years.

It's been eighty years since Aziraphale—

He shudders a breath he doesn't exactly need—but by that logic, he didn't need Aziraphale either. He shoves down the sickeningly poetic notion that he might compare his angel to the air in his lungs, lest it become more bitter than ironic.*

* _These are, of course, not mutually exclusive. Crowley merely endeavors to never feel more than one (1) emotion at a time.**_

_** He often fails._

The world has changed.

He's not sure why this surprises him—it's been 6000 years on this hell of an earth, and it's never stopped changing once. 

Perhaps because the world had the utter audacity to move on without Aziraphale there to see it. 

_But it hasn't_ , something nasty hisses in his mind. _He's been out there this whole time. You’re the one who’s forsaken him._

Crowley groans, guilt and grief and frustration mounting in an overwhelming tidal wave in his chest.***

*** _Case in point._

He shoves his face desperately into his pillow, squeezing his eyes shut against the static in his head and reaching for the void of sleep once more.

But the noise in his head is insistent. Like a stubborn neighbor who keeps knocking because he doesn't know what's good for him.

Like—

Like Aziraphale.

And he finds himself in the streets of a London almost a century older than he remembers.

His clothes are outdated, he thinks almost hysterically, stepping dazedly into the sunlight. It's an easy enough fix, and his clothes shift around him like a second skin as he takes in the people on the street, forcing the last of his grogginess to fade into wakefulness. 

The city is different. The Shard, once gleaming and bright against the sky, is now overshadowed by new skyscrapers that sparkle beyond low-hanging clouds. But the old, familiar alleys he finds himself wandering are lined with crumbling brick and rotting wood, barely holding themselves together in the face of change.

He knows the path his feet are taking him. If he didn’t know better, he would fault a God he’s not sure he even believes in anymore.

And when he arrives, the pillars of the bookshop are faded and cracked. Crowley’s stomach drops. 

To the human eye, the bookshop is unremarkable. An old, derelict building that stands in remembrance of a time long gone. 

Crowley sees nothing but the epicenter of disaster. 

There’s no more grace to sustain it, he realizes, suddenly sick. He reaches out, and understands why he felt Aziraphale vanish so acutely 80 years ago. 

Gabriel ripped Aziraphale’s grace from him, and in doing so, ripped it from where it was rooted half the city. 

He used to be able to feel Aziraphale’s grace creeping like crystal dendrites through the oldest parts of the city, holding it together like glue. Aziraphale always hated change. And now, everything is different.

He blinks through the haze of nausea, seeing the _people_ filing out of the shop, books in hand, for the first time. 

The sudden urge to curse and scream at them swells in a hot rage within his ribs. Red letters spell _AUCTION_ in massive print outside the door, and it’s just one more piece out of place in the nightmare that’s come to life. 

It's easy to pick out the man in charge. His aura is as oily as his hair and screams of _greed_ almost as loudly as his own self-importance makes him speak. If Crowley cared, he would be an easy mark. 

As it stands, he can hardly muster a demand to know what's going on.

The man raises a bushy eyebrow, looking up from his phone with thinly veiled disdain. 

"The owner went missing. Took a bit for anyone to notice, too," he says, as though it had been a personal inconvenience. Crowley's fingers crack loudly. "The investigation finally went cold, and the property transferred to the council. Feel free to take a look at what’s left." 

He gives Crowley a look one might give to vermin and turns away, promptly yelping in disgust as he slips in a massive pile of dog shit, dropped by a stray that appeared quite suddenly just moments before. 

And if his phone also falls to the sidewalk and shatters as he tries to keep his balance?

Well. Crowley has no sympathy for inconveniences today. 

Vindication fades quickly into apprehension as he walks tentatively through the doors. 

Dust swirls through the air, kicked up by careless feet that don’t belong. What furniture remains is covered in sheets, and the shelves are mostly empty. Only a few stragglers mill about, their footsteps creaking among the shelves. 

Everything— _everything_ —is gone. 

The shock of it hits him like an ice bath, and he inhales sharply through his nose. 

He freezes, sucking in another breath before it leaves him again with a soft groan. 

The smell of Aziraphale hasn't left the shop.

Aziraphale smelled like sunshine. Like rays of golden light warming the dust of an old, well-loved book. Like _home_. 

He mentioned it once, and Aziraphale had muttered, "It's just the shop, dear," while failing not to look enormously pleased. 

Crowley stands with his eyes closed, inhaling lungfuls of air until his chest aches with it, and lets the sharpness of the memory wash over him.

Someone bumps into him from behind.

"So sorry, dear boy."

Crowley's heart stops.

He turns and stares.

The man looking at him has dark brown skin, deep laughter lines, and snow white hair betraying his age.

His eyes are impossibly blue.

"Are you alright?" He speaks softly. Genuinely. With concern that Crowley is all too familiar with.

"Fine," he chokes.

And then there's a firm hand guiding him to a dusty, sheet covered chair (and he wants to protest, because this is _Aziraphale's_ chair, his own is— well, he's not sure where his has gone), and his heart is in his throat, and he finds he really does need to sit down before his knees give out anyway.

"No need for lies between friends," the man says gently, still looking more worried than Crowley really feels he has any right to be.

"Are we?" he asks bitterly all the same. "Friends?" 

This is not Aziraphale.

And yet—

"You know, I think we must be," he says kindly. "Why don't you tell me what's wrong?" 

There's a million things Crowley wants to say. A million things he never got to say, and by God, if this is his last chance—

"The books—" is all that comes out instead.

He must sound truly ridiculous, but the man nods thoughtfully.

"There's a lot of memory in a place like this."

His voice is a rich timbre. He has a copy of Oscar Wilde tucked into his elbow, and Crowley shudders.

"How old are you?" he croaks.

The human raises a sly eyebrow. "Oh, come now, I thought we were friends." 

Crowley doesn't want to know what shows on his face to make the man put a hand gently on his arm and say, "Turn 80 tomorrow." He stands up straight, and he laughs as his knees give a hearty pop. "Feels like 6000 sometimes, though." 

"Happy birthday," he whispers, because it seems like something Aziraphale would like to hear. 

"Oh, well thank you, my dear." 

He ducks his head to hide the tears that find their way from behind his glasses and down his cheeks, avoiding the look of soft pity creasing the man’s face. 

"Say, there's a nice bakery across the way. Been in the same family for generations—looks like you could use some tea."

His name is Raffi, Crowley learns.

He listens raptly as Raffi cheerfully regales him with the tale of his wondrously human life—the very miracle of his existence—all over tea and those familiar lemon raspberry scones that haven’t changed one bit in almost a hundred years. 

“Are you happy?” Crowley asks finally, and Raffi’s eyes twinkle over the edge of his teacup.

“Oh, I’ve been so blessed,” he says softly. “So blessed.”

Something akin to relief fleetingly outshines his grief. Crowley never did like the tragedies.

“Why don't you come by for lunch with the family tomorrow?” Raffi invites, and Crowley couldn’t say no if he wanted to.

He leaves Raffi with a handshake and what he hopes resembles a smile, while some part of him runs wild with hope that bubbles anxiously just below the surface. Or is it frustration?

He doesn’t know how to fix this. For the first time in a long time he feels helpless.*

* _Not counting the Debaclypse, where Crowley figures most everyone felt quite helpless, and rightfully so._

Raffi is not Aziraphale, and yet… he _is._ His teeth grind painfully in his jaw. He doesn’t know how to draw Aziraphale out. It would take a miracle. 

So he starts, as he figures that all good things must, at the Ritz. 

The fact that the particular cake that Aziraphale was always especially fond of has a waitlist of several weeks comes as no obstacle. It takes painfully little effort to waggle his fingers as he clears his throat, and all of a sudden the maître d' exclaims that _actually_ , it just so happens that an order due to go out yesterday had been cancelled last minute, and it was his if he’d like to make the purchase. 

Crowley clears his throat again, and _pardon_ , the order’s already been paid for, why, he’ll just go ahead and box it up for him.

“Must be your lucky day!”

“Must be,” he mutters, cake in hand. 

And the next day Crowley makes his way to Raffi’s with the cake from the Ritz, unsure what he expects it to do.

Raffi lives in a little white terrace house where the city starts to give way to the countryside. It's not terribly difficult to find*, but he finds himself double checking the address with a furrowed brow at the sight of an ambulance parked quietly at the curb.

* _Nothing is difficult to find when the car does all of the work._

A small crowd of neighbors hover inquisitively around the sidewalk. He pushes past them, ignoring the murmurs, to where the door stands open. 

Silence hangs thick and heavy inside the house. In another room, he can hear a low voice speaking soothingly to a woman who gasps quiet sobs, and dread turns his blood to ice. 

Heavy footsteps creak one by one down the stairs, and Crowley looks up at a man in a green uniform. 

"What happened?"

The EMT looks regretful. "He died in his sleep."

Numbness, cold and heavy, sinks down to his fingertips from somewhere deep inside his chest. He's distantly aware of the EMT offering his condolences, but his voice sounds like it's underwater. A warm hand rests briefly on Crowley’s shoulder, and he nods jerkily, ears ringing. 

He’s lost Aziraphale again. 

He’s failed him, _again_. 

He stumbles dazedly for the door, knocking into a squat little table that wobbles precariously on uneven legs. Something hits the floor with a heavy thunk, and he blinks down at his feet.

The Oscar Wilde.

Swallowing, he picks it up and brushes the dust off the cover with hands that shake so much he almost drops it again. Gilded lettering shines dully on the cloth cover.

_The Happy Prince and Other Tales._

The spine groans with age as it falls open in his hands, heavy yellow paper cascading to each side. 

_'Indeed,'_ he reads, _'I know of nothing in the world that is either nobler or rarer than a devoted friendship.'_

_'And what, pray, is your idea of the duties of a devoted friend?' asked a Green Linnet, who was sitting in a willow-tree hard by, and had overheard the conversation._

_'Yes, that is just what I want to know,' said the Duck, and she swam away to the end of the pond, and stood upon her head, in order to give her children a good example._

_'What a silly question!' cried the Water-rat. 'I should expect my devoted friend to be devoted to me, of course.'_

_'And what would you do in return?'_

Words blur indecipherably on the page, and he closes the book with a snap, tucking it inside his jacket. 

Outside, more people have gathered round the tiny grass yard. He shoulders past them again, before freezing with his hand on the door of the Bentley. 

A shadow shifts unnaturally out of the corner of his eye.

Death stands idly in the shadow of a tree, cloaked in black and cradling a white, quivering light that sighs like a breeze against his skeletal chest. 

Crowley aches, the pain of it overwhelming him. 

**"** _You_ ," he snarls. "Give him back to me."

Death cocks his head curiously.

"And what, Crawly, will you do with an untethered soul?" 

He—

He would carry Aziraphale inside him, if he had to.

He would press Aziraphale’s grace into his own heart and feel it burn him from the inside out, so that Aziraphale might walk the Earth with him until the end of time. 

He finds he doesn’t have the words to speak.

"He cannot die," Death says simply, bemusedly, and lets go. 

Aziraphale’s soul dissolves into glittering pinpricks of light that dance upward in the wind like a dandelion, brightening the sky as if the sun were coming out from behind a cloud. 

The crowd of neighbors that have been drawn from their homes look skyward, still murmuring amongst themselves until the door to the ambulance is shut with a deep thud, bringing a wave of hushed silence as Raffi’s body is driven away.

Crowley slips away, grasping the book with a white-knuckled hand, and Death watches him go. 

* * *

Crowley doesn't sleep again.

He doesn't look again, either.

Aziraphale finds him all the same.

He's not _proud_ of the circumstances, per se, but he wouldn't be a demon if he was ashamed of it, either.

He asked Beelzebub for his job back.

They were wary of him, understandably, and something deep inside him preened that Heaven and Hell should still fear him. That their plan— _Aziraphale's_ plan—worked so flawlessly.

Until, of course—

He swallowed.

"Do we have an agreement?" he asked, feigning aloof nonchalance that belied his nerves.

And so he finds himself in the Netherlands, not long after, for a temptation that takes far too long to pull off. It’s complicated, surprisingly delicate work. It can’t be done with brute force, like the kind of work Hastur is partial to. It makes him wonder how long this particular temptation has gone unassigned. 

Perhaps Hell is testing his mettle.

He’s in Amsterdam for weeks, whispering in all the right ears, toying with the hearts and minds of important people—and the unimportant ones that never suspect they’re part of something bigger. 

Crowley doesn’t ask what the endgame is. He doesn’t care, if he’s honest.*

* _Aziraphale always insisted he was_. 

But he manages to finish early. Hell seems pleased, so he spends a day meandering through the city, slinking through the backstreets and across the chilly canals until he finds himself in Vondelpark, staring at the ducks that swim in the pond.

 _Ducks never change_ , he ponders sullenly. He doesn’t have any bread. He’s tired, and doesn’t much want to spare the energy for a miracle, but what’s a duck without bread? What’s wine without cheese? What’s a demon without—

Well.

He turns to leave and stops.

There's a little girl sitting on a bench to his side.

Her hair is so blonde, it's almost white. He _knows_ those eyes. She has a smattering of freckles across a tiny upturned nose, and she's eating a red ice lolly.

She must notice him staring. He’s not exactly subtle about it, half turned to face her, mouth gaping. 

“Do you like strawberry?” she asks, looking at him quite seriously. She seems rather unfazed at being stared down by a strange man in a park. Her small legs swing merrily beneath her, tiny shoes just barely scuffing the pavement. She can’t be older than eight, possibly nine, and it _fits_. 

Crowley swallows. 

"It's my favorite," he admits softly.

She nods, as if in approval, and slides down the bench in an invitation. Crowley sits, dazedly. 

“Markus at school says strawberry is for babies,” she continues, and Crowley doesn’t have to imagine the haughty disdain coloring her childish voice, “but Markus likes blue raspberry, even though there's no such thing.”*

* _She says there’s no such thing as blue raspberries much in the same way people often say there was no such thing as the Garden of Eden. Both statements are incorrect. They were both once very, very real, and existed together long before they were lost to humanity’s memory._

“ _And_ he still believes in Sinterklaas, so I think he’s just projecting his insecurities.” 

Crowley snorts suddenly at her words, looking at her in startled delight that soothes the deep ache in his chest like a balm.

“Maybe you should tell him the truth,” he offers. Her head whips around to look at him, and her face is conflicted.

“But Mam says that wouldn’t be nice.”

Crowley shrugs, lips twitching.

“Everyone’s got good _and_ bad in them. Sounds like this Markus has it coming, really.”

She laughs brightly and looks at him thoughtfully.

“You’re funny,” she declares. “What’s your name?”

“Crowley,” he offers with a hand. 

“Anjolie,” she returns. Her entire hand fits in his palm as he shakes it gently, and the ache returns full force. 

“Isn’t it a bit cold for an ice lolly?” he manages to ask her. She shrugs.

“They don’t melt in winter.”

“Clever,” he agrees. 

He sits quietly while she continues to babble cheerfully about everything and nothing, making sure to nod and hum in all the right places. It's wonderfully familiar, and for the first time in a hundred years, there's a lightness inside him that sparks feebly to life. 

When her mother calls her, waving from across the street—a pretty woman, though her hair doesn't shine quite the same way—Anjolie hops from the bench, offering him a wide, toothless smile. 

"It was nice to meet you, Mr. Crowley!" she calls back as she trots away.

"Stay safe, angel."

He watches until they're out of sight, before letting his head fall back with a sigh. The bench is freezing against his neck, but it brings a sharp sense of clarity he isn't willing to give up just yet. 

Or maybe it was just Anjolie. 

Either way, he thinks with a shaky sigh, it's a relief. Two of Aziraphale's lives— _both_ happy and comfortable—have crossed his path. Until he can fix this, it has to be enough. 

Maybe he can play the role of godfather again, he ponders. Or nanny. 

Sinterklaas could be fun. The idea brings something almost like a smile to his face—imagining Anjolie's awed confusion as she pulls the bow off a new bike as her parents look on, bewildered. 

A block away, the unearthly screech of metal against metal shatters the peace of the park. 

The ducks stop quacking, and park-goers pause in their walks, glancing at each other in unease. 

_No._

Time feels frozen, and he holds his breath.

And then a woman screams, and he's running. 

_No, no, no, no, no—_

He's not the only one. People shout to each other— _Call 112,_ they say—as cars congest in the road, horns blasting in confusion. Blaring sirens already sound somewhere in the distance, echoing in disharmonious chaos in the street. 

Bystanders swarm into a buzzing mob, gasping and shouting at the edge of an intersection where the woman is still wailing. Ragged moans rip their way from her lungs like a wounded animal, and Crowley realizes with sickening clarity that he never heard sirens at all. 

He shoves his way through. Déjà vu sends his head spinning, a flashbulb memory of a little white house swimming in his vision. 

And when he finally pushes his way to the front, the sight has him twisting to get away as quickly as he tried to get through.

No miracle could save Anjolie now. 

An odd hush settles over the crowd as the same understanding spreads through them like a wildfire. He can hear a man now, sobbing from the street: _There was ice_ , and, _Please, God, have mercy_. 

Crowley stumbles, lightheaded, back through the congregation. 

And when he looks up, Death is there, watching. 

* * *

He doesn’t always find Aziraphale. 

The decades pass, and Crowley carries on. There’s a tension that never fully leaves his body—the price of constant vigilance, and the fear that a wrong turn at the wrong moment means another lifetime without Aziraphale.

In the meantime, he works. 

There’s a Catholic monastery in Brazil—one of the last strongholds of Christianity in an age where Crowley has wondered at the predominant atheism of the human population. 

He doesn’t know why the Ineffable Plan might call for godlessness, but he thinks he might understand it anyway. 

And regardless of his own misgivings—of the uneasiness his wavering understanding brings, and his own sense that something that neither Heaven nor Hell would have ever anticipated is nigh on the horizon—Hell seems pleased. 

“Let’s start picking off the stragglers.” Beelzebub’s orders, rife with icy vitriol, bring him to Olinda, to the Mosteiro de São Bento, and he knows long before he arrives why Olinda has held on so long. Why the temptation has gone so long unassigned. 

Crowley _knew_ Benedict of Nursia, long before his veneration. 

Long before Crowley stood before a gilded basilica, she stood before Saint Benedict clothed in nothing but her own long, crimson hair. He had looked upon her not with desire, nor pity, but with sympathy.

“Are you content, Serpent, walking a path of temptation?” He had asked her.

“Do I have a choice?”

“No evil dooms us hopelessly except the evil we love, and desire to continue in, and make no effort to escape from.”*

* _Later, a lush Crowley would echo these words to an enraptured angel.**_

_**Much later, after a century asleep, Crowley would find them published in a book that sat pointedly on a pedestal in the front room of a bookshop in Soho._

Crowley returns to Hell empty-handed, offering nothing but a lie woven of nettles and briars. Hell extols his success, oblivious to its hollowness, and turmoil roils in his gut.

Now, Crowley takes one look at the white-haired, white-skinned young monk in Olinda—soft-spoken, with a soft middle wrapped in deep robes that contrast so sharply with the colorlessness of his skin—turns on his heel, and leaves. 

When the Basilica burns the next day anyway, taking— _blessedly_ , the town whispers mournfully—only one life in the wretched clutches of red flame, Crowley is commended, and he nearly cleaves his tongue in four biting back the urge to scream, wondering why history keeps repeating itself. 

* * *

A few decades later, he meets a young collegiate fencer with hair the color of sunlight. They die in a freak accident just hours later, a rapier through their heart and agony in their eyes.

* * *

Crowley isn't an idiot.

He recognizes the pattern. 

No miracle—no power granted unto to him by God—can stop it.

He's tried. _Undo what’s been done_ , he's begged, emptying himself of everything until he’s nearly irreparably drained, barely more than a husk, a shell—a _human._

And still—

When Crowley finds him, Aziraphale _dies_.

* * *

He’s known for awhile.

But it's one thing to know something, and another to acknowledge it, and he's spent his whole life ignoring truths he'd rather not face. 

And when it comes time to face them, he does it with alcohol.

There’s a seedy bar that’s been in New York for centuries. It’s an old speakeasy—musty and dark, but otherwise unchanged in the three hundred years since she first slunk her way inside in the 1920s. It was a heady den of temptation and indulgence, then. Now, Crowley doesn’t know why she goes. She doesn’t know what she's looking for—why she makes the opposite effort. 

But she sits at the bar, downing glass after tiny glass of sharp spirits until there are enough empty drinks beside her to make the bartender’s face crease with concern as he clears them away. 

She orders another, and he eyes her with wariness. 

“I think it’s time to cut you off,” he says, not unkindly, and Crowley waves her hand with a put-upon sigh. His eyes glaze and he pours her another glass. 

“Much obliged,” she mutters. She swirls the glass, mulling over its contents in a fog. 

There's no precedent for this, she knows. She doesn't have the faintest idea where to go from here. Aziraphale has never lived for more than a day after he's been found, and Crowley can only do so much. It's _infuriating_ , that Gabriel should win. 

She knocks back her drink in frustration and stares dully at the dregs pooling in the bottom of the crystal. Maybe the bartender was right. Maybe she should call it quits. 

Maybe she should give up.

Guilt immediately clenches in a vice around her heart, and the bartender pours her another drink.

Behind her, the door opens and closes with a heavy wooden thud, and the hair on the back of her neck stands up despite the warm air. She downs her drink to muffle the hysterical groan that threatens to escape her throat. 

The man that approaches her is tall, which is vaguely amusing to some drunken recess of her mind. Blond hair again, she notes, but his eyes—

She supposes the humans would call them blue.

Another failure of humanity, she muses, that their languages are so limiting. 

No, Aziraphale’s eyes are not blue. 

To call his eyes blue would be to call Aziraphale human, and both are a disservice to the truth. A thousand annular threads of gold burst from his pupils like a halo. Like Crowley’s halo, once upon a time, coiled from filigrees of starlight that showered sparks of liquid gold into her hair. 

These eyes are for her. Two halos, enough for the both of them, stretching into a cloudless indigo sky.

Satan below, but she’s tired of this.

He settles onto the stool beside her and orders something expensive. His accent is American, which is also amusing in its own strange brand of irony, but he’s unerringly polite, and his voice is warm and throaty as he leans over and asks her what she would like. 

“Not in the mood, angel,” she drawls. 

If she leaves now, she thinks, they might avoid the inevitable. Dread already coils like a viper, oily and writhing, in her stomach. 

“‘ _Angel?_ ’” he echoes, humming. His eyebrows have shot Heavenward, his lips curling into an amused smile. “A lesser man might think you were sending mixed signals, darling.” 

Crowley thinks of oysters in Rome. 

She’s no stranger to temptation. She knows exactly what it feels like to have her willpower slowly worn down until it slips away with a whisper, like silk, leaving her bare and vulnerable and susceptible to the inkling of a suggestion of satisfaction yet to come. 

Crowley has never been able to resist Aziraphale. 

And her dress is made of silk.

* * *

Their taxi, miraculously, doesn’t hit a single red light on their way through SoHo.

His fingers stroke along the back of her hand where it rests on the seat in the narrow space between them. They slide between her own, caressing her fingertips like the flame of a candle. Every nerve sparks with sensation. Anticipation shoots like lightning down her spine as his nails, though dull, drag lightly over her skin.

Crowley swallows. 

She can feel the focus of his gaze on her, and she squirms in her seat. The rustle of silk is quiet against the leather. The pounding of her own heart drowns out everything else until the taxi comes to a stop against the curb of a white rowhouse, and the driver holds out his hand with a grunt.

For a moment, she had forgotten that there was more to the world than Crowley-and-Aziraphale. 

It’s quiet, still, as she ducks out of the cab. The echo of her heels clicking on the pavement is the only sound on the street, barring a car so distant she wonders if it’s just the sound of blood rushing in her ears instead.

Her heart sits in her throat.

 _This is wrong_ , Crowley thinks wildly. Her stomach flutters with trepidation, and she finds she doesn’t quite care. 

Not-Aziraphale slides a thick, brassy key into the lock and turns it with a click. She holds his eyes as she steps inside. Has she forgotten how to breathe? 

He guides her to the bedroom, following so closely behind her that she can feel the heat of his chest burning like sulfur against the bare skin of her back. His hand curls softly around her elbow, and he turns her gently in his arms so he can step into her space with a hand at the small of her back. 

_There’s still time,_ she thinks desperately—for what, she isn’t sure.

He leans forward. 

A brush of lips is all it takes, and Crowley is lost—falling upwards, ecstatic, as if Heaven itself is cradled in Aziraphale’s arms. Her skin burns where his hands sweep beneath swaths of silk, divine grace branding its mark upon her skin, agony and relief swirling furiously together in a tidal wave of grief that brings an unholy flood of tears angrily to her eyes.

She can _feel_ Aziraphale inside this body. It’s the closest she’s been yet, and she presses her body closer so that she might feel him inside hers. 

The delicate skin beneath her lashes stings as his fingertips brush her anguish away. Her dress flows down her body like holy water, fluid and burning as his hands blaze a covetous trail of fire in its wake. 

And then Crowley is left bare and trembling, unable to tear herself from the overwhelming, celestial not-blue of his gaze, bearing witness to the overflow of more love than she can stand to be the object of—more love than he should remember to feel.

But she’s greedy, she knows, and so is her body. If she couldn’t have Aziraphale before, she’ll have him now before she loses him again.

His lips press hungrily to the speckled skin of her shoulders, open and soft, ever more gluttonous than any angel has the right to be. The flesh of his tongue flicks out to drink in her skin like sacramental wine, and for once Crowley is glad for Aziraphale’s humanity—glad that he is absolved of this blasphemous, hedonistic sin. 

Crowley is bare to him, though Aziraphale remains hidden to her yet beneath the barrier of his clothes, and she hunts for his skin through buttons and collars until his hands still her search at his throat.

“I would worship you first,” he breathes, guiding her to sit at the edge of his bed before kneeling between her legs. His mouth traces a path up her thigh, his hands gently grasping her ankles until her feet rest on either side of his knees. 

His lips find her hot center weeping with fluid, his tongue seeking another taste before his lips surround her clit and begin sucking thirstily—like a man forty days and forty nights into a desert—and Crowley is already spasming in ecstasy, her mouth falling open as she curls around his head, her fingers tangled in the golden halo of his hair. 

But Aziraphale doesn’t stop. Aziraphale has never judged her. He keeps taking her pleasure as she moans and gasps and writhes, spreading her legs even further apart. Her back arches towards or away from him, she doesn’t know, and she never knew it could feel like this, she’s _never_ —

She wants _more_.

Crowley draws him upward—those damned blue eyes reappearing to soak up whatever debauched sight she must make—and tears at the layers of his clothes until she has him in hand. Until she’s guiding him inside her and her vision blurs behind tears of longing and relief once more. 

Until he’s moving reverently above her, eyes wide in awe as his hands push her thighs wider, thrusting closer as they both, enraptured, watch the slide of his flesh in and out of her receptive body.

Crowley focuses on the hot coil of lust tightening her core, if only to distract from the searing waves of love she can feel thrumming through the air. Aziraphale’s hands slide up her thighs, tracing her ribs before tangling their fingers next to her head. His hips grind slowly against her, barely moving in and out but rubbing her clit mercilessly—minutes passing torturously as he lazily presses kisses to her neck, her lashes, the corner of her lips. 

Her entire body is throbbing, aching in a way she hasn’t felt since the days after she Fell, and Crowley wonders that something that feels so incredible might also be her penance. 

She can feel his movements start to quicken, his breath growing uneven, and she reaches out with one of her last slivers of conscious thought to stretch the minutes, to keep him longer. Her fingers slide down his shoulder blades, searching for the ghosts of wings she knows she won’t find, until her fingers brush _something_ vibrating in the aether. Something that feels like it’s trying to fight its way out.

Stunned surprise is enough of a distraction that time resumes its normal pace as her focus slips. Crowley gasps as Aziraphale thrusts forcefully inside her, clenching around him with every part of her body that she can. Her hands slip from his back to his arms, and she forgets about wings altogether as the nerves inside her alight.

Crowley feels it the moment he spills inside her, and her belly floods with warmth. She’s almost desperate enough to want to keep it, to let his seed germinate inside of her until she has a piece of him with her forever, but her body is already burning it away as Aziraphale presses more kisses to her lips. 

Her body is taut and desperate, one last cord of lust desperate to be snapped, but Crowley knows she won’t find anymore relief here tonight. 

He slips free, and Crowley is once again cold and bereft.

Aziraphale—or at least, the body he possesses—kisses her softly, lazily, falling into a slow slumber beside her, breath soft.

And Crowley weeps.

She doesn’t stay to see what happens next, sliding her dress back over her quaking shoulders and slipping quietly from his home. 

Death is, quite literally, waiting outside his door.

“What is it this time?” She asks snidely. “ _Le petit mort_?”

“A heart defect,” Death answers simply.

"Seems like those are going around,” she snarls, before deflating just as quickly. Her breath catches in her throat. “Why _me_?”

Death regards her silently. 

“Have you not questioned, Crawly,” Death says finally, “why he has never failed to find you?”

Crowley stares. 

“Why you?” Death repeats grimly. “Because you are Crawly, and he is Aziraphale, and he will seek you out until Kingdom come. But the body of Adam is fragile and cannot contain the force of the angelic grace trying to claw its way back to you. His death is wrought by no more or less than holy miracle.”

“Is this my fault?” she begs. Her eyes burn and Death swims in her vision.

“It is not my place to pass judgement.” A scythe appears in his hand. “Only to carry out the sentence.”

And then Death is gone.

And Crowley realizes that, this time, she never knew Aziraphale’s name. 

* * *

He could come up with a thousand excuses to explain why he spends the next several decades in a self-imposed exile on a spit of sand in the South Pacific. 

In another life, he might have even enjoyed his time there—baking on a sun-warmed beach, sipping from coconuts that swish with rum instead of water. He spends his nights staring at the whorls of the Milky Way, remembering which stars he scattered in a white blaze across the black velvet of the sky, and refusing to acknowledge why he hasn't run away altogether.

Then Hastur crawls out of the waves like a Lovecraftian sea monster, crusty with barnacles and dripping with saltwater, irate and bringing an equally angry missive from Hell.

So Crowley goes to Korea for a temptation, some 500 years after the Debaclypse. 

It's grunt work, difficult and tedious, and it takes longer than he'd like.

He meanders through a winding market on a small island off the coast of the mainland. It smells like the sea, salty and wild, lined with rows of tantalizing treats that draw small children like a moth to flame: Sweet, steaming pastries shaped like little fish, fat rice cakes, and oranges the envy of Eden, larger than his fist.

His target is close. He turns out of the main corridor into an alley that dead-ends at a windowless, concrete wall, and waits.

A fat frog writhes and wriggles its way through a crack in the concrete, landing with a slimy smack at his feet. Crowley's lip curls. 

"What are you doing here?"

"Is it done?" Hastur's voice is little more than a wet croak. 

"I'm working on it," he hisses back. "I need more time." 

Hastur laughs, wet and raspy. "Hell's starting to doubt you, boy."

"That's their problem, not mine," Crowley snaps.

"It's about to be your problem." Hastur's face is suddenly inches from Crowley's own, breath foul in his nose. "You get one more day." 

Crowley shoves past him wordlessly, emerging from the narrow corridor with a scowl. 

A man, mousy-haired in a garish blue suit, weaves his way past him. He sticks out like a thumb, standing a head over the rest of the crowd and speaking loud, American English into his phone. 

_There_.

Crowley sniffs, ducking his head and preparing to follow, and nearly runs headfirst into a young Korean man who steps into his path.

“Excuse me, sir?"

Crowley blinks. 

"My name is Jun." He extends a hand forward, smiling beatifically. If he's put off by Crowley's wary glower, it doesn't show. 

Humans don't often approach him. Most know better, something inherent in the human subconscious making their skin prickle with leeriness at a threat they can't see or understand. Thus is the nature of the life of a demon, he knows: Damned to walk in solitude until the end of his days.

Crowley peers closer. Something about Jun's aura is uniquely bright, silvery blue and warm. 

It reminds him of Aziraphale—of the way a human would _shine_ after one of his blessings. 

But it's not him. Not this time. 

"What do you want?" The demand is cold, more sibilant than he intends, and a sudden memory—the phantom sensation of Aziraphale's elbow in his side, chastising his rudeness—is so real, so visceral, that he can feel a bruise bloom black and blue beneath his skin. He presses his fingers to the offending rib, his breath leaving him in a huff at the ache.

Jun remains unbothered, though his hand falls back to his side.

"Actually," he says mildly, "my grandmother heard you talking."

He gestures behind him to a woman sitting cross-legged among stacks of wonderfully lush green cabbages bigger than his own head. She's _old_ . So old Crowley can feel it in his _own_ bones. But her pale, flyaway hair and unseeing eyes—irises black as night encircling a starburst of cataracts—carry the weight of her age in a way that the straightness of her spine does not. 

_Oh._

"She's worried you don't have anywhere to go for dinner, and wanted to know if you'd like to join us." 

"Oh."

He glances over Jun's shoulder, swallowing tightly as he watches the man in the blue suit turn a corner and disappear, and makes a choice.

* * *

Aziraphale’s name is Haneul this time, Crowley learns.

He follows the pair meekly through dizzying alleyways, having found himself unable to refuse. Haneul’s arm is looped lightly through her grandson’s as he guides them down the endless, narrow streets. They arrive at a small, well-kept house in a tiny part of town—a hanok that gives an aura of stubborn refusal to be swallowed by the urban jungle around it. 

Inside is warmer than the chilly evening air, and he takes in Jun’s parents and the young man who must be his brother as they regard him curiously, but without surprise. They all radiate the same unseen brightness as Jun—as Haneul. Not quite as ethereal, but no less brilliant. 

His stomach feels strange. It aches and churns with some feeling he can’t put a name to. Jealousy? Anger? That these humans might have stolen a lifetime with Aziraphale away from him?

 _It’s not their doing_ , his conscious chides gently. The voice sounds unmistakably like Aziraphale’s, mellow and cheery. The serpent in his stomach takes an unceremonious bite of itself. 

Jun’s mother beams at him, stepping forward and taking his hand.

“Umma said we would have guests for dinner,” she says, and the last of his resentment melts away. “She has a good sense about these things.”

He goes by Anthony tonight. Haneul’s face twists wryly at the sound of his name, and her eyes, though sightless, swivel to meet his own. His heart does something odd in his chest—leaping, straining as if to escape his body and go back to its rightful owner. Something in the air is pulsing, charged with divine energy like the atmosphere before a bolt of lightning.

If Crowley didn’t know better, he would be afraid. But Aziraphale is close to the surface. He knows it. He can feel it. And instead, he feels nothing but the wildest hope. 

A pot clatters somewhere behind him, and her eyes tear away from his own as she shouts something he doesn’t understand into the kitchen. He deflates and exhales raggedly, drawing her blank gaze once again. But she says nothing, ushering him instead to sit at a low table already laid out with more banchan than all the food Crowley has eaten in the last century combined. 

Dinner is a warm and homey affair. The company is kind and raucous, the food hearty and flavorful. Aziraphale would have loved it, he thinks. And judging by the gusto with which Haneul eats, he notes, a sort of sad humor swelling like a balloon in his chest—well. Suffice to say, he _does_. 

For the first time in a long time—since he _Fell_ , he realizes with a start—he almost feels like part of a family again. 

Haneul smiles at the head of the table. 

Later, when the house has quieted down and Jun has given him their spare futon, Crowley waits, awake. 

The sun has long since set, and the air is heavy and thick with silence. 

It’s not long before he hears the whisper of Death in the otherwise silent home. 

"Wait," he pleads. 

Death regards him silently and nods once. 

Crowley exhales sharply, suddenly frightened. He treads quietly to the small bedroom in the corner of the house, sliding the door just enough to slip inside. 

The body on the pallet is sleeping softly. He sinks to his knees, his bones thudding quietly on the dusty floor. He reaches slowly for the feathery wisps of white hair laying temptingly on the pillow, his fingers just barely brushing the most flyaway of strands before freezing, his breath catching as her eyes open and look right at him as if seeing beyond the starry curtain of darkness shadowing her sight. 

"I know you," she breathes in English. 

" _Aziraphale_ ," he chokes. 

Delight shines upon Aziraphale’s face. " _Crowley.”_

Crowley heaves against the horrible sobs retching their way out of his throat, his head sinking to Aziraphale’s breast. A soft hand finds its way into his hair, and he blindly seeks out the other until a set of strong fingers finally twine firmly with his. 

"I'm so sorry, my love," he hears, and he finds himself unable to say a word. "I'm sorry you've been alone. I've missed you terribly." 

His hand is pressed against a pair of wrinkly lips, dry and crackled. Not the plush pink things he’s spent far too long imagining beneath his own. 

It’s a benediction nonetheless. 

“Aziraphale,” he croaks, reveling in the taste of the name on his tongue, “I'm going to fix this, I swear to you—I swear I'll bring you back to me.” 

Aziraphale smiles. “If ever I’ve believed in anything, Crowley, I believe in you.”

“It is time.” 

Crowley had not forgotten Death, yet the sound of his voice makes his heart drum with panic.

"Oh, do spare us a moment." Aziraphale’s voice is snappish, and he sighs as Death falls silent. "Crowley," he whispers again, smile watery. "I’ll find you again." 

Aziraphale looks at Death and nods once, eyes falling shut. Death lowers his scythe. It passes through Aziraphale’s chest, and the breath leaves his body with a sigh. Crowley feels the hand gripped tightly in his own go limp as Death gently pulls Aziraphale’s glowing soul from his heart.

It’s almost too bright to look at, strung on the end of the scythe and straining away from Death like a tide, fluid and powerful.

Death holds it in his hands before letting it go.

They sit in silence.

"This is not the way it is meant to be," Death says finally, tiredly.

"Then fix it," Crowley begs.

But Death is gone, and Crowley leaves before sunrise.

* * *

There is nothing to stop a demon from walking into Heaven. He knows this already.

And so he marches through the gates, ignoring the acrid stench that suffuses his lungs and seeps into his veins—ignoring the angels that seem affronted but too confused to act, each waiting for the others to take action first.

In another life, he might have been amused. 

He still remembers the way. He forges past his wide-eyed audience, down the wide corridors that he knows will lead him to the Throne of God.

There's a commotion behind him, but he doesn't stop.

" _Hey—_ " 

And then Gabriel is trotting in front of him, ruffled and looking only slightly less out of his depth than the angels that gather curiously behind him.

"Uh, Hell is _that_ way." Gabriel points to the floor, and the angels titter excitedly behind him. 

Crowley shoulders past, leaving smouldering footsteps in his wake. "So go there yourself."

There's nothing left he can lose. 

The doors to the throne room shine like the sun, golden, beaming, and impossible to look upon without pain. They swim before his eyes, and he falls to his knees before them.

"What is your purpose here, Crawly?" 

Metatron. 

"I demand an audience with God." His head pounds viciously as their voices echo off the doors like a gong. 

"No one makes demands of the Almighty." 

“I’ll wait,” he snarls.

“So be it.”

And so Crowley waits.

Time passes differently in Heaven than it does on Earth. He remembers it from before, and he feels it acutely now—simultaneously slower and faster, memory and rebirth. It was always disorienting at best. But his body doesn’t belong here anymore.. He can feel his skin withering as Heaven swirls nauseatingly around him. 

And he knows, deep inside, as he wilts, that Aziraphale has lived dozens more lives without him. 

Angels—but none of them _his_ —congregate around him. Hundreds of unblinking eyes stare at him, morbid fascination plain on their faces as they whisper in a language he no longer understands. 

It feels like a millennium—it _could_ be a millennium*—before Gabriel finds his way before him again. 

_*It_ is _a millennium._

"Hell's going to kill you," he says flatly. "You know, I've gotta hand it to you. You've really outdone yourself this time."

Crowley ignores him. Gabriel steps closer. A brown loafer nudges his leg. 

"Really?" Exaggerated astonishment colors his voice. "You've got nothing?

Silence. 

And then Gabriel's face appears nauseatingly in his vision, eyebrows raised in surprise that's no longer derisive before morphing quickly back into a mask of practiced apathy. 

“You’re dying.” 

Crowley hears the words as if they’re spoken in an echo chamber. They clatter around his head like a bell, a fact—spoken as such—that rings sharply and makes his eyes burn anew.

“ _So be it_ ,” he spits mockingly. Gabriel’s face shifts curiously, from detached scrutiny to unsettled confusion to _guilt_ , and oh, that’s Crowley’s favorite. _Too late_ , he thinks, spiteful glee wrenching a laugh that bursts, unhinged, from his mouth. 

Gabriel rears back and Crowley wonders what sort of picture he must make. 

He’s losing it, he realizes detachedly. The last shred of awareness he has screams at him that he’s not meant to be in Heaven this long, while the rest of his mind floats slowly out of his own reach. 

Gabriel leaves, and no one else comes.

His vision starts to fade. 

A voice inside of him whispers. 

_You failed._

Part of him—tranquil, already gone—wonders why this matters. Another part of him, the only one that still watches in horror, weeps. 

It's strange—he doesn't remember Heaven being so dark. 

_I'm going to die_ , he thinks. It settles over him like a blanket, heavy and undeniable, and he closes his eyes and waits to drift.

Suddenly, he's no longer alone.

" _How long would you wait for him_?" She whispers.

" _Forever_."

Suddenly—or perhaps not suddenly at all—he's being cradled. He's crying again with the shock of it, bombarded with so much love he can hardly bear it. And all of it, every single agonizing iota, is for him.

He can see again. He can _breathe_ again. The smell of sulfur and acid no longer burns his nose, and a weight is stripped off him like an old snakeskin. His corporation is gone, he realizes. He's naked as the day he was born, and Heaven smells like Eden again.*

* _Heaven, as it's meant to, smells like perfumed gardenia. Wild grass after a fall of rain. A lilac bush at the height of its bloom. Sugar maple. Blue raspberry. Flora that never once existed on Earth, and flora that did, and was lost.**_

_**The closest anything has come to smelling like Heaven on Earth again was Crowley's garden._

" _My son_ ," She says softly. Sadly.

"You abandoned me." His accusation is nothing more than a broken whisper. 

" _Never_ ," She whispers fiercely. " _I have always loved you_." 

"Then _why?"_ he begs, and he's not sure what exactly he’s asking, or what answer he's hoping to hear.

" _Because Aziraphale needs you_.”

He's too tired, too devastated, to muster confusion. "But I couldn't save him." 

" _Gabriel acted in cruelty_ ." Sadness radiates like mist from the maelstrom of Her existence. Tears, hot as molten lead, plummet from his eyes and are swept away just as fast by Her hands. " _Just as you acted in love. You are still my creation, Crowley. I gave you your heart, and Hell cannot burn it away_."

He shakes his head, vehement and grief-stricken. "You should have spared him."

" _From pain or love? In the end, he would only have lost both_."

"I'd give anything. Please," he begs again, lost. Found. "Please. Please."

God smiles sadly. " _Even yourself_?" 

" _Yes_."

She presses Her lips to the crown of his head with a sigh.

Everything goes white.

* * *

Consciousness, as it always does, seems to come slowly. 

Darkness gives gradually to light as Crowley fights away the last of his grogginess. His body is numb, and he stares blankly at the ceiling, taking stock of his own body. He feels hungover, and as much as he tries, he finds he can’t will it away. The buttons of his shirt strain as he inhales. His eyes fall closed once more beneath a furrowed brow as he tries to remember.

Everything feels fuzzy, like a dream slipping away with the break of day. Like those nights spent drunk with Aziraphale, where they wracked their brains for distant memories of days long passed, arguing good-naturedly over whose side might take the blame for Charles Dickens.*

* _Crowley would argue that Hell could never be responsible for something so sickening as A Christmas Carol. Aziraphale would argue that Heaven could never be responsible for such mind-numbing drivel as Dickens’ endless droning.**_

_**In a way, they were both right. Dickens managed to be utterly unbearable just fine on his own._

He blinks again, sighing in frustration. He forces his eyes to stay open despite their heaviness, searching for answers he won’t find in the ceiling—

The _ceiling_. 

In that moment, Crowley swears his heart stops in his chest. His throat constricts, and in some recess of his mind, he’s absently thankful that he doesn’t need oxygen the same way humans do, because he finds himself quite unable to breathe even if he wants to. 

He _knows_ this ceiling. His hands clench the blanket beneath his body, and he knows it, too. He knows the shadows on the far wall, how the light beyond the window casts them late into the night—and he knows again, suddenly, what he thought he had forgotten. 

Air finally finds its way back into his lungs as he eases himself out of his old bed, in the apartment he had sold centuries before. The glasses he had once worn, long out of style, sit unassumingly where he always left them on his nightstand. The metal frames are cool against his fingers, and they settle comfortable and familiar in front of his eyes. He wonders, for a moment, why everything seems so blurry, before he remembers to blink. 

The corridor is as he left it, and his breath leaves him again in a rush. Plants that should have long crumbled to dust quake in fear as he runs his trembling fingers over their green leaves in confusion and awe. 

It’s too much, and he can’t for a moment begin to fathom what it might mean. 

_Purgatory_? He wonders hysterically, sinking to the polished concrete of the floor. Vertigo overwhelms him. The sound of his blood rushing through his ears is a dull buzz that won’t stop. 

To his credit, it only takes a few long moments after the echo of a sudden clatter to realize it’s the sound of his old phone vibrating its way off his desk. 

Something inside him seizes with fear. He doesn’t allow himself to feel hope. He doesn’t want to answer, unsure who’s calling, but he finds himself crawling into his office anyway, picking his phone up off the floor and turning it over to look at the cracked screen. 

Adam. 

Adam Young. 

_Adam Young,_ whose funeral Crowley quietly attended after he passed away at the astonishing age of 132, is texting him. 

> _What did you do?_

He swallows, wondering how to answer. 

His phone buzzes again.

> _Something’s different and Anathema says she feels it too, and it wasn't me._

It’s petulant and painfully familiar, and he means to reply—

But the tiny numbers at the top of his screen read _2019_. 

Three weeks after the Debaclypse. 

And then the Bentley—his beloved Bentley—is roaring toward the bookshop on miraculously clear streets before he’s barrelling his way in through the double doors, looking wildly around the floor.

Aziraphale looks up from where he’s staring at his own hands in wonder.

" _Crowley."_

And then it’s but a moment before he’s wrapped in a desperate embrace, gasping as they both fall to their knees. Hands roam, searching for skin and grasping at hair, trembling as they brush quivering lashes and lips. 

" _Azira—_ "

The name falls, choked, from Crowley’s lips like a strangled prayer as _Aziraphale_ kisses him, searingly warm and blindingly golden. His lips are triumphant yet tremulous with unbridled love that crashes over them both like a wave—enough so that even the tattered remains of his own wretched, demonic soul can't be blind to it anymore. 

It's almost too much for his human body to bear. 

His wings burst forth in a flurry of silken feathers he can't control, iridescent vanes and gilded tips that flutter helplessly behind him as he sags against Aziraphale's body. He feels Aziraphale sigh softly against his lips and the telltale whisper of wings materializing from the aether—soft plumes whiter than the eyes of God, that whisper more sweetly than baby’s-breath against his own. 

A beat, a gust of air, and Crowley blinks to find them kneeling on a plush sleigh bed in the flat above the shop. For a moment, all he can do is stare—drinking in Aziraphale’s eyes, his nose, his lips. The quirk of his smile, and the gentle crinkle at the edges of his eyes. 

Crowley clutches at Aziraphale's hands—those gentle, genteel hands—pressing his fingertips reverently, one by one, to his lips. The skin of his hands is soft as sin, and Aziraphale stares at him, sapphire eyes wide as he rakes a thumb across Crowley's bottom lip.

"I love you."*

* _It doesn't matter who says it first, in the end. It was true, either way._

Their clothes melt away, and Crowley tries, as he did all those centuries ago, to press himself closer. The human part of him aches, hot and pulsing in time with his wild heart. He wants to crawl inside of Aziraphale, or maybe to have Aziraphale crawl inside of him, alone in a world of their own making. No Heaven, no Hell, no Alpha Centauri—only Crowley and Aziraphale. 

His knees bracket Aziraphale's thighs, his hands sinking into the downy joints where feathers meet flesh, and he curls himself forward, dropping his head into the warm place between Aziraphale's shoulder and chin. His lips graze, searching and finally sucking at the pulse he finds beating just as quick as his own. He resists the urge to use his teeth to hold on and instead scrapes them carefully, reverentially, across pale, freckled skin. 

Aziraphale's head tilts back, a soft " _oh_ " ghosting breathily across Crowley's ear. His hands slide from Crowley's wings, down his back to his flank, where he pulls Crowley closer, pushing up from the bed to meet him in the middle. 

His length lies swollen and heavy against Crowley’s. Heat pools in Crowley’s groin and he writhes, remembering the the last time.

Crowley swallows. "I—" His breath hitches, and so do his hips. 

"Hush, darling. Let me look after you." 

He can only obey as Aziraphale eases him back onto the pillows. The plush linens give way to the squeeze of his fists, his legs draped over Aziraphale’s, splayed and vulnerable and _his_. One of his feathers flutters silently to the floor as his wings, stretched far enough to graze the walls of the room, beat uselessly over the sides of the bed. Aziraphale’s hands, solid and warm, soothe over his skin. His thumbs rub soft circles on the pale muscles of Crowley’s inner thighs, and Crowley’s eyes squeeze shut, disbelieving and anguished all in one. 

It’s a dream he’s had too many times. Terror that this isn’t real—that he’ll wake up alone, _again_ , perhaps millennia into the future, in a world where he’s lost everything. Blindly, he forces his hands from the sheets and reaches for Aziraphale. 

A deep shudder wracks his frame when his hands are caught in another pair he knows as well as his own, warm with life and very much _real_. He feels, rather than sees, when Aziraphale presses his knuckles to his lips before twining their fingers together and shifting forward to rest his weight against Crowley’s chest. Kisses so soft they’re almost unbearable press onto his cheeks, his eyelashes, and finally his lips. 

“Open your eyes, dearest.”

More kisses, fiery and delicate—brushed against his neck, his jaw, the sigil beside his ear—slipped over the sharp planes of his body—brushed carefully against each of Crowley’s fingertips—do little to distract from the agonizing slide of Aziraphale’s body, slowly, deliberately, up Crowley’s own. The tiniest touch of Aziraphale’s tongue from between his lips is almost too much, so light a taste he can feel it on each ridge of his fingerprint, and yet makes him wonder if he actually felt it at all.

He shakes his head almost wildly, gasping for air. 

“ _Crowley_.” The admonishment is gentle, laden with the same grief that squeezes his heart like a vice. “I’m here. Open your eyes.” 

He does, and _oh._

He knows now, that the eyes of each of Aziraphale’s incarnations were all cheap facsimiles of the real thing—in each life, Crowley would look and see his grace, trapped as if in a glass house, beating against the walls until it shattered. 

Now, he remembers what color they are. 

“Aziraphale,” he breathes. 

Aziraphale smiles. “ _Yes_ , Crowley.”

His body jerks, and his legs lock around Aziraphale's soft waist. 

"I want—" he gasps.

Another smile, pressed warm and soft to his mouth. 

"I know." Crowley can feel the vibration of the words against his skin—taste them on his tongue. 

Aziraphale’s fingers trace languidly, confident and comforting down his palms, and then feather soft against his forearms—down his ribs, and then lower, lower still. 

Crowley’s breath leaves him with a sigh. 

He lets his legs relax, falling wider at Aziraphale’s sides as a careful finger pushes gently at his hole. Already, it’s not enough. It doesn’t take much to perform the tiniest of miracles, and he sighs as Aziraphale’s fingers suddenly give way, slipping with ease into his body, now open and slick and greedy for more. 

Aziraphale pulls back from where he's peppering Crowley's shoulder with slow kisses and looks at him in surprise. 

Crowley flushes, pink and burning hot. "Please," he begs. 

A hand caresses his cheek, and he turns his face into Aziraphale's palm to press his lips to his heart line. 

"Alright." 

When Aziraphale pushes inside him, he's lost. 

It's more than he can bear. Not just physical—Aziraphale is inside his very _soul_ , moving reverently over the parts of him that have fractured and hurt, and healing them with gentle caresses and so much love he almost bursts with it. 

He's only peripherally aware of the fullness of his physical form, so caught up in the ecstasy of feeling the very essence of Aziraphale's being swirling with his own _._ He realizes distantly, with some relief, that he knows now what left him so bereft in New York.

Aziraphale glows, sighing lovingly. “You’ve done so well, Crowley. So well.” 

He moves like a tide, a push and pull in and out of Crowley’s body. Constant. Faithful. They move together, reveling in it. Time moves like molasses, and they draw each moment out—each velvet glide of skin against skin, each knot of pleasure that tightens deep inside them. 

Crowley’s body twitches, and he tries to hold on. Every stroke inside of him is an electric spark, and he arches off the bed as Aziraphale’s hands grasp at the small of his back, pulling him up until Crowley can sink deep onto his lap. 

His hands sink into Aziraphale’s feathers, and for the first time, his pace stutters. When he closes his eyes, he can see their true forms—the way they swirl together, faster and faster, a pair of stars caught in each other’s orbit.

And when they supernova—when Crowley is spilling everything between them, and Aziraphale is spilling _inside_ of him—he knows they won’t be torn apart again. 

* * *

Golden sunlight warms the blankets where they lay tangled together.

"I looked for you." Crowley's voice, when he speaks some time later, is muffled from where he's buried his face in Aziraphale's shoulder. 

Aziraphale hums, dragging his fingers through Crowley's hair. "I remember." 

Crowley pulls back, face devastated. Aziraphale hushes him before he can respond. 

"I didn't know then, but I do now—and that's all that matters." Aziraphale tugs him back down to the pillows, rolling to face him as he tangles their legs in the sheets. A mischievous smile tugs at his lips. "I remember New York." 

Crimson heat brands Crowley's cheeks as he winces. "I shouldn't have done that." 

"But I am so glad you did." Their noses bump as Aziraphale presses their foreheads together. "It was still my choice."

Crowley shudders, exhaling raggedly. 

"What was his name?" He asks finally. 

Aziraphale hums again, thoughtfully. "You know," he muses, "it's on the tip of my tongue. But everything's a bit—" he waggles his fingers " _—fuzzy_." 

If anything, Crowley looks guiltier. Aziraphale sighs.

"Do stop blaming yourself, Crowley," he chides gently. "It's not your job to be my keeper." 

Crowley snorts, a tiny smile tugging at his lips. "I don't think it's up to me, angel," he confesses, just as tenderly. 

He leans in to press his lips to Aziraphale's throat, missing the way Aziraphale's face pinches curiously until he presses at Crowley's shoulders.

"You spoke with God," he ventures hesitantly. 

Crowley pulls back, throat bobbing as he swallows. Aziraphale watches him silently as he rolls onto his back, worrying at the frills on the edges of the blanket. 

"She saved you," Crowley says at last. He stares blankly at the ceiling. "She saved _me."_

He startles when Aziraphale tangles their fingers together.

"God does not grant salvation lightly." His words are firm, and Crowley shudders again. Aziraphale soothes his thumb across the back of Crowley's hand, before sighing. "Crowley, did She explain _why_?" 

Something in his voice is strange, and Crowley looks at him sharply. 

"Not in so many words," he admits slowly. "Ineffable Plan and all, I suppose."

Aziraphale nods, shifting again. 

"I see," he says finally. Crowley watches as Aziraphale pushes the covers to the side, sliding from the bed to tread unashamedly naked from the room. Crowley sighs from his nest of pillows, listening for Aziraphale's footsteps as they pad back to their little loft.

The bed sinks as Aziraphale settles in beside him once more. Crowley rolls back into his warmth, pressing his face into the soft skin where hip turns to thigh. 

Paper rustles quietly in Aziraphale's lap, and Crowley pulls back to see his hands clutching a heavy piece of clean, white stationery embossed with swirling gold script he can't quite make out. 

"Angel?" he probes. 

Aziraphale swallows. His eyes flicker across the page before he passes it to Crowley.

"This was on my desk this morning." He fails to offer any more of an explanation, but it's enough. 

Crowley takes the paper reluctantly. It's warm—more so than it should be from Aziraphale's hands alone. There's a single line, and he reads it over a dozen times, and then a dozen more, heart stuttering in his chest. 

"I was rather hoping you knew what it meant," Aziraphale says quietly, and Crowley looks at him, incredulous.

His hands tremble, and he rakes his fingers through his own hair as a disbelieving laugh punches its way from his chest. Aziraphale's face reflects the same cautious hope that swoops jovially in his gut, and he can't help but lean in and kiss him. He lets his hands rest on Aziraphale's cheeks, fingertips brushing the curls at the tops of his ears, even as he reaches to grasp at Crowley's wrists. 

They pull back, only to lean back in, and by the time they come apart again, the sky is violet and the sun has fallen below the horizon. 

"I think we're _free_ ," Crowley whispers against Aziraphale's mouth. He knows it's true as the words fall from his lips, and peace settles heavy over his body—no Heaven or Hell to hold them back.

* * *

They notice slowly.

The days in the South Downs pass with endless hazy summer afternoons. They lose count of the lazy evenings spent curled before the fireplace, silent but for the evening rains pattering on the old windows of the cottage. 

Crowley notices first. 

The plants become less obedient, and he gripes at Aziraphale.

”You can’t _coddle_ them, angel, look at these leaves, see?”

“I promise you, my dear, I haven’t bothered with your plants since the last tantrum you had about it.”

“It wasn’t a tantrum, just _look_ at the croton—”

One day they stop trembling entirely. That same afternoon, Aziraphale announces he feels peckish, and Crowley has a creeping suspicion that bothers him altogether less than he feels it should. 

One particularly sleepy afternoon, Aziraphale dozes off on their picnic blanket until he’s woken by fat raindrops catching on his eyelashes. 

Hunger becomes more pressing, and Aziraphale makes a full on habit of sleeping in the evenings.

“It _is_ quite pleasant,” he defends, tucking himself soundly beneath the blankets of their bed.

The day Crowley finds a gray hair is the same day Aziraphale turns red as an apple and excuses himself to use the restroom for the first time in 6000 years, and when he emerges several minutes later, they both snort before dissolving into laughter and then salty tears. 

They make the reservation by phone, and it takes three weeks to get in. 

The Ritz is as unchanged as ever.

They gorge on the beef tartare and the Kentish lamb, and drink far too much champagne for their somewhat newly delicate countenances.

And when Aziraphale lifts his flute, clinking it lightly against Crowley’s own, he says—

“ _To humanity_.”

**Author's Note:**

> REFERENCES:
> 
> All art and banners by little-arcadia <3
> 
> Oscar Wilde from _The Devoted Friend_ , published in _The Happy Prince and Other Tales_.
> 
> "No evil dooms us hopelessly except the evil we love, and desire to continue in, and make no effort to escape from." from _Daniel Deronda_ , by George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans).
> 
> Context for the Temptation of St. Benedict can be found [here](https://www.youngandcatholicng.com/2017/07/11/7-things-you-must-know-about-st-benedict/). Creative liberty was taken, and I'm probably going to Hell anyway: 
> 
> "Several accounts tell of Benedict’s struggles with the devil. In one, during his time in seclusion, St. Benedict was visited by the devil, disguised as a blackbird. The blackbird flew very close to him, hovering near his face. Aware that this was the devil, St. Benedict blessed himself with the sign of the cross and the bird immediately flew away. Soon after, the devil tempted St. Benedict with the memory of a woman he once knew. He was so overcome by desire for this woman that he was tempted to leave his life of chastity. Suddenly, St. Benedict spotted large thorn bushes nearby and threw himself into them in the hopes of extinguishing his desire. When he got up, his flesh was badly torn and scratched, but he overcame his temptation. St. Benedict believed it was God’s grace that helped him resist the temptation of his flesh and avoid sin. He later described that by the wounds of his body he cured the wounds of his soul." 
> 
> My fic has a fucking works cited. Who am I?
> 
> ***
> 
> An announcement for those of you that care: Jenetica and I are actively working on the sequel to Angel of the Morning. Go read it if you haven't, and if you _have_... We acknowledge that we're dicks for that ending. And we're sorry. 
> 
> Cheers!


End file.
